Needs: Who Needs who? The Mortal or the Endless?
by L.E. Burnell
Summary: The Endless all have important jobs that they all must do and certian mortals they must looks after. What if there is a mortal who is taking the time of all the Endless? They must find who he needs most, or which one of them needs him the most.
1. Explaining All The Time

Delirium rarely spoke with family as a whole, normally just one member at a time. She wasn't sure how they were all together at her older brother's realm and not in their own but she didn't mind. She rarely got to see her family as a whole, normally just one member at a time.  
  
Delirium sat cross-legged on the smooth floor of her brother's home. Her eyes were bright as she watched her older siblings speak in hushed tones. They were waiting on one more of their family but Delirium didn't care, she rarely spoke with her family as a whole, normally just one member at a time. Unless you counted Destiny, he seemed to be more than one person, but only one. And Desire didn't really have a sex but she was still one person, only one. Like Dream, or Death, only one person. Kind of like how she had had only one doggie. But she lost him once. She also found him once. She couldn't remember is she still had him yet. She did have her fishie though. The ingenious Mr. Borghal Rantipole. She had made him a fishie and put him on a string oh-so inconspicuously so he could lead her.  
  
There she was. Delirium looked up her head tilted to one side. The last of the Endless to arrive, Despair, and with her their prodigal brother Destruction. "I am grateful you have been able to come here." Dream spoke to both of them with a bow of his head.  
  
"Why aren't we in my realm brother?" Despair looked at Dream with apathic eyes. Delirium still didn't know why they had all congregated the way they had. She rarely spoke with her family as a whole. . . normally just one member at a time.  
  
"It was easier for me to call you all here to my realm then for me to call you to your realm."  
  
"Mr. Borghal Rantipole would have lead me wherever I needed to be." Delirium smiled up to her brightly colored fish on its string.  
  
"I'm sure he would have sister." Desire didn't look to Delirium as he lit up another cigarette from her heart shaped lighter. "I'm sure he would."  
  
"This boy we can see from my windows. We should go there."  
  
There was a nod from Dream and the family which Delirium rarely spoke to as a whole was transported to his gallery. Despair opened a door of sorts to her realm with ease delivering them all to her gray world. Delirium's eyes widened and brightened at the same time while she whispered to her fishie. "Mr. Borghal Rantipole, you wouldn't lead me here unless you told me right?" Her voice fluxed as she followed her older sister Death to a large arch-shaped window.  
  
"There he is brother, the one you wanted us all to see." Despair motioned to the window. Through it Delirium could see a young man sitting in a large chair dark black hair (almost as black as Dream's) hanging around his face (which was almost as pale as Dream's but because he was human, Delirium thought the boy was human, it couldn't be white like the snow, but it was close). His posture was nonexistent as he sat, slumping his shoulders and back so he leaned onto his knees.  
  
"He's pretty." Delirium looked to Desire who gave her a slight nod. "That he is."  
  
"I remember him." Death walked closer to the window and leaned forward her thin ankh falling forward clinking against the window. "He's the one that was taken away from me." She shook a finger at the window. "And he didn't want to be taken either. Well, at least he's still alive."  
  
"I don't think he feels the same way you do about that sister." Delirium thought it was funny how Destruction and all the other Endless rarely ever called their siblings by their names, only brother and sister. "I am guessing that Despair has watched him endlessly because of how many times I have visited him both because of what he brought upon himself as well as to others." Delirium moved through her family (which she rarely spoke to as a whole) to the window. She looked into it with pressed lips and squinted eyes before she exclaimed pointing to the window. "I know him! I know who he is! I see him sometimes. He's always so sad too, but he's ever so nice to me. Very nice, yes, very nice. He told me he would help me look for my doggie with me." Delirium turned away from the window. "Have any of you seen my doggie?"  
  
No one answered but she saw Dream look to Destiny, the large rusty book still chained to his wrists, hood over his eyes. Did Destiny even have eyes Delirium wondered. She had never seen them, no one else had either. Were they pretty like hers? Two different colors? Green with silver flicks through them and vein blue? (Did the flicks go in the green or blue eye? She couldn't remember.) Destiny said nothing and Dream spoke. "He longs for you sister." He looked to Death who raised her eyebrows and gave the window another glance. "And is bonded eternally to you" Dream pointed a thin finger at Despair "because of you." Now he pointed to Desire. "I see this all in the Dreaming."  
  
"It's not my problem." Desire looked up her amber eyes catching Dream's as he lit another long cigarette with the artful lighter.  
  
"It is your problem Desire." For the first time Destiny spoke demanding Delirium's attention from the window. "This boy is taking too much of our time. We all have our own jobs we must attend to, and if we are all busying over this child things are not accomplished as they should."  
  
Eyes turned back to the window. "Why don't you just take him to your realm sister?" Desire looked to Death. "He wanted to be there with all those who he wants."  
  
"I know." Death looked into the window. "But I can't take him. There are rules that must be followed."  
  
"Rules. . ." Delirium made a face wrinkling her features and clenching onto the string attached to the Mr. Borghal Rantipole. "Always rules. I want to see him again. But I want him to be happy! So he can help me look for my doggie. He promised me. We could find many treasures looking for my doggie. Like last time, when I found this neat word that meant green and red at the same time I think I have it here somewhere." Delirium began to search through the pockets and folds of her clothing.  
  
"What will we do Dream?" Death still looked into the window.  
  
"We will see who he needs more and then go from there."  
  
"Mr. Borghal Rantipole, do you know where my word went?" Delirium mused. "He needs me most! Or is it that I need him. . ." She put on a face and placed a finger on her bright red lips.  
  
"He needs us all Dream, just like we all need him. Don't be stupid. As long as he lives he needs us all." Desire cast the window a sidelong glance. "It's that simple. But the rules . . . who will go first?"  
  
"Go where? Mr. Borghal Rantipole, do you know where it is Desire is talking about?"  
  
"We all can't leave our realms at the same time little sis, things would fall apart. One at a time we will see this boy and by the rules we will see who he needs most. Or which of us needs him the most."  
  
"Oh, let me go! Please let me go first! Let me talk to him again!" Delirium turned to Dream with a pleading look. "Oh, let me go first!"  
  
Dream looked to Destiny who gave him a mute nod. "Go to your gallery to leave."  
  
"Oh thank you Dream! Come on Mr. Borghal Rantipole!" Delirium pulled on the string running away from the window through the mists of Despair's realm.  
  
Death still looked into the window when the other Endless dismissed themselves back to their own realms to wait for their turn with the boy. "Despair." Despair turned and looked to her sister who touched the window gently.  
  
"Yes?"  
  
"Do you think he may need me?" 


	2. Pipe Cleaners Not Sex

pDelirium skipped through her realm before opening a tear in it finding herself in a large room of the mortal world. Yards beyond her was the man that she had seen moments before in Despair's realm. She clapped her hands and noticed that the string holding the Mr. Borghal Rantipole was gone from her hands. "I wonder where he could have gone off to..." Delirium shrugged as she pondered the thought momentarily before running up to the back of the chair. She threw her arms around it and covered the man's eyes with her small palms, "Guess who!"  
pShe could feel him jump under her touch and then relax or come to some sort of middle ground between apathy and forced conversation. Sadness or some surreal off shot oozed from the young fellow's pores. "Lady Delirium, it's been a while." Even from his voice. Delirium wanted to take a can of aerosol and spray his body down with it. His sadness was coating the room with an slime that was reminiscent of the fluid that coats the handle of a brush when a young girl uses it to masturbate. Gooey and cold Delirium screwed her features together. The word "stuffy" came to mind.  
p"Ohhh. . . . don't call me that!" Delirium pulled her hands away from the man's face and drug them along her thighs. The last action was unnoticed by her that served a self cleansing act to remove the ooze she felt. "It's much too stuffy that name is. Stuffy, stuffy, stuffy." Her voice was sing-song raising and falling like a kite that had its string entangled in a tree. " Just like Dream." Delirium thought fondly of her brother as she spoke to the young fellow who had promised to help her find her dog. "You know you look a lot like Dream." Delirium fondly spoke of her brother a smile spreading across her painted lips, "Only your hair is straight. Dream's is kinky. Like. . .pipe cleaners! Not like your sex." Delirium giggled with a sort of silver laughter that found its way through the ooze of self masturbation and into the boy's head. His eyebrows rose, and he almost smiled. "The last time I used pipe cleaners was to make a little spider." Delirium happily continued on her explanation concerning the connection between the boy's hair to her fondly thought of brother's and then her fondly thought of brother's hair to kinky pipe cleaners (not kinky sex) and then these pipe cleaners to spiders which brought her back to the boy she stood near. She giggled. "Do you like spiders that are kinky and black like my big brother's hair?" She bounced from behind the overstuffed armchair so she sat in front of him staring up to him from an equally overstuff footrest. He now sat up straight, well, straighter than before. The curve of his spine was only that of forty-five degrees presently. "How did you know it was me?" Delirium peered into the boy's ebony eyes that reminded her of her fondly thought of brother even though her fondly thought of brother had no eyes.  
pThe boy shrugged a bit the raise and fall of his thin shoulders screaming to be seen under the cotton fabric that encapsulated his upper body. "Lucky guess." Delirium looked at the boy once again. Only this time she really looked instead of just looking. He was in one of "those moods" again. "Why are you here, Delirium?"  
p"Because you promised you'd help me look for my doggie!" Delirium spat out her reply too quickly even for her own tastes. Something about that response didn't seem entirely correct. The boy looked her up and down then nodded once as if he resigned to her childish ways. "You're right. I did promise you."  
p"But that's not the real reason I came here today, no I had something else that had to do with you, you and yourself." Delirium had not even fully heard the response that had come from the boy that reminded her of her fondly thought of brother. She was busy retracing her steps both literally and figuratively. She had hoped from the ottoman and walked backways while continuing her verbal recount. "Hm. . . what was it. . . I was with the Mr. Borghal Rantipole and then I was at Dream's and --- oh yes!" Delirium's voice jumped up an octave, and she was once more before the boy like a faithful pet on her knees leaning forward to the boy's face. "The Endless are fighting over you." She smiled slyly bright eyes sparkling as she touched his nose with the index finger of her left hand. "You are the prize in a war."   
p"A war?" The boy's voice was skeptical. The heat wave that had coursed through his body beginning and ending in his genitals was slowly burning the ooze away from his mental body.  
p   
p"A war of the Endless." Delirium leaned back onto her legs. "You see... you need us all all the time. Or maybe we need you all the time." Delirium touched her own lips in thought while her green and blue eyes flittered upwards, "Either way, all the time can't be. Cause other people need all the time. Not all of us all the time. Only some of the time. But your all the time can't be all the time or even some of the time. And rules that Dream has told us said that all the time is bad, and you can only belong to one of us. And even then not all the time, because all the time is bad. And I want to see if you can belong to me. Or maybe I can belong to you. Like a doggie. Speaking of my doggie-" A fish swam up from Delirium's orange hair. "-we have to go find my doggie. Or at least look. And you have to smile at least once. You can smile. Unlike Stuffy Big Brother. And we will go see the Pretty People again." Delirium thought of the last time that the pair had visited the memories of the boy's psyche. The Pretty People were all dead. Or at least unattainable. One of the Pretty People was a boy with white hair. Del liked this guy. She wondered why the boy liked him. Loved him was more the word she thought. Loved him very much but hated doing so. Del didn't know why. She liked love. She loved love. Love went with the Pretty People.  
p   
p"The Pretty People." The boy repeated Delirium's last words. 


End file.
